Barry's presentation on Access to Government from the Ideas Festival

1. Access to government (and the media)‏ Barry Saunders, Research Coordinator – Democratic Renewal, Centre for Policy Development (also: WWF / Earth Hour)‏

3. What do you do What does your organisation / campaign do, in one sentence? Three common terms for what you do? What is the cycle of what you do? Is it time limited, or timeless? Legislative, or popular movement? Local, global or both? Who are your likely partners? How do you view the role of government?

4. Working out strategy Where do you want to be seen? What do you want to be seen to be doing? When do you want to be seen? Are you proactive or reactive? Do you want to engage with the mainstream media? Do you operate on a moral, political, logical or emotive level?

5. Finding your place Who are your allies? Who are your critics? Who are your supporters? Where are your supporters? Who are you? What are your issues?

6. Tools Tech understanding: websites and email. There are more technical tools, but let's keep this manageable. The tools are there for when you need them. If you use RSS, most of these ideas work well with RSS. If not, email works too.

7. Get out your notepad Write down: names of people involved Issues you cover People who love you People who hate you People you like Politicians who are relevant Public figures who are relevant

8. Google alerts Create as many as you need Put term in quotation marks to avoid erroneous results Pick an appropriate frequency

9. Hansard

10. Tracking politicians http://Greensmps.org.au http://kevinpm.com.au/ http://malcolmturnbull.com.au/Home/tabid/36/Default.aspx http://openaustralia.org (Hansard, Parliament)‏ http://projectdemocracy.com (Senate)‏

11. Government blogs

12. Advanced research and outreach Blogs.com.au + RSS Wikipedia alerts Wikileaks alerts Cryptome.org Sourcewatch.org Blog subscriptions http://technorati.com/

13. Outreach Does your organisation need to be on top of the news? How rapidly? Less about damage control, more about avoiding misunderstandings and correcting errors early

14. Social media Ask yourself: why do I want to use social media? Some good reasons: reaching community Promoting self, raising visibility Interacting with supporters, journalists, politicians Early warning system for PR issues Not a broadcast medium. Expect some pushback.

15. Don't Do not: create a blog if you can't update it regularly (3 times a week at a minimum)‏ Do not: recreate the wheel. Tools are there, use them. You do not need your own social network.* Do not: create a social media space and then just use it to push your content Do not: allocate half an hour a week of social media time to an intern and expect it to work Do not: listen to hucksters who promote SEO and FAST RESULTS OMG OMG

16. Do Do: signup for an account on the major social media spaces with your most common organisation name, even if you don't intend to use the site. Do: involve all your organisation's members in the discussion of what to do with your social media. Do: take your time getting to know the appropriate register of the medium Do: allocate enough time to do it well. A good social media strategy can save you a lot of grief and can bring in supporters. Treat it as an important part of your campaign, and it will reward you.

17. Twitter Yeah, it's the flavour of the month. Even so. You can reach opinion makers, journalists, celebrities, business people. You can get wind of PR issues very early, and make corrections before they blow up. You can monitor using keywords.

18. Twitter

19. Twitter search

20. Twitter search

21. Government blogs

23. Facebook Have a facebook page with contacts, events Facebook group if you think it's useful Facebook app – seriously think about why. And then think again. Possibly a third time. (and then don't do it.)‏ Can be good for early warning Tactical use can be good – 5 million strong etc. But only of use as a peg for a new story (and even that is rare)‏ Seriously, don't make a facebook app.

24. MySpace Yeah, have one if you have to.

25. Blogs Do you need one? What's your publishing output? Do you want comments and feedback? (Really? Why?)‏ Would you be better served by commenting (and guest posting) on other blogs?